The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Carnation plant, botanically known as Dianthus caryophyllus, grown commercially as a container plant and hereinafter referred to by the name ‘Hilrees’.
The new Carnation plant is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in De Kwakel, The Netherlands. The objective of the breeding program is to create new container Carnation plants with numerous semi-double flowers.
The new Carnation plant is a naturally-occurring whole plant mutation of Dianthus caryophyllus ‘Koes’, disclosed in U.S. Plant Pat. No. 22,370. The new Carnation plant was discovered and selected by the Inventor as a single flowering plant from within a population of plants of ‘Koes’ in a controlled greenhouse environment in De Kwakel, The Netherlands in May, 2011.
Asexual reproduction of the new Carnation plant by terminal cuttings propagated in a controlled greenhouse environment in De Kwakel, The Netherlands since November, 2011 has shown that the unique features of this new Carnation plant are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations of asexual reproduction.